John A. Pople was born in Burnham, Somerset, england in 1925. He received his undergraduate and graduate education at Cambridge University where he was a pupil of Sir John Lennard-Jones. Subsequently, he was a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge (1951-58). Lecturer in Mathematics at Cambridge (1954-58) adn then Superintendent of the Basic Physics Division of the National Physical Laboratory, Teddington (1958-64). From 1964-93 he was Carnegie Professor of Chemical Physics at Carnefie Mellon Univesity, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and later John Christian Warner Professor of Natural Sciences. Since 1993, he has been Trustees Professor of Chemistry at Northwestern University.

Dr. Pople is a theoretical chemist who has worked on molecular applications of quantum and statistical mechanics. he is the author of a number of papers on liquid structure, spectroscopy (particularly nuclear magnetic resonance) and molecular orbital theory. He is part author of three books on high nuclear magnetic resonance and molecular orbital theory.

His awards include the Smith Prize (Cambridge 1950), the Marlow Medal (Faraday Society 1958), the Irving Langmuir Award (American Chemical Society 1970), the Harrison Howe Award (American Chemical Society 1971), the Gilbert Nerton Lewis Award (American Chemical Society 1977), the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Senior U.S. Scientist Award (1981), the G. Willard Wheland Award (University of Chicago, 1981), the Evans Award (Ohio State University, 1982), the Oespar Award (University of Cincinnati, 1984), the Davy Medal (Royal Society, 1988), the Wolf Prize in Chemistry (Jerusalem, 1992), the J.O/ Hirschfelder Award in Theoretical Chemistry (1993), and co-recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1998). He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of London (1961), Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (1971), and a Corresponding Member of the Australian Academy of Science (1993).